The present invention relates to a producing method of a semiconductor device and a film forming apparatus used therefor, and more particularly to a semiconductor device producing method wherein a satisfactorily patterned semiconductor layer or backside electrode of an amorphous silicon solar cell can be formed by simple and easy steps, and a film forming apparatus used in forming a semiconductor layer or a backside electrode of an amorphous silicon solar cell wherein a fine threads are provided in close contact with a film forming surface of a substrate and therefore the patterning operation can be performed concurrently in the film forming operation, a separate patterning step can be eliminated and the producing cost can be reduced steeply.
Hitherto, for the purpose of the integration, the patterning of an amorphous silicon semiconductor layer or a backside electrode is conducted by utilizing high-energy beam such as laser beam.
However, in the patterning operation for an amorphous silicon semiconductor layer by utilizing laser beam, there are problems that the characteristics of a solar cell are lowered due to a damage to a transparent electrode, and that the contact resistance between the transparent electrode and the backside electrode changes with the passage of time (i.e. the resistance increases) at the laser-scribed portion.
In addition, the patterning of the backside electrode using laser beam is highly difficult and results in unstable production. Consequently a method such as the etching method or the lift-off method other than the laser patterning method is reluctantly employed, but in that case there is caused a different problem that the yield is lowered and the producing cost is increased due to the increase of the number of the processing steps and the lowering of the productivity.
Further in any of the above cases, patterning has to be performed after the formation of the amorphous silicon semiconductor layer or the backside electrode, and thus the number of processing steps increases and consequently the producing cost increases.
An object of the present invention is to provide a producing method of a semiconductor device and film forming apparatus used therefor, which enable the film forming operation and the patterning operation to be carried out simultaneously without lowering the characteristics of a semiconductor device.